DONATE

DONATIONS

We are currently accepting donations for 2017

To support, please click on the DONATE button below

Your donations go toward several causes including but not limited to:

1) PROTOS EDU - Protos Edu are electronic music and digital arts education projects that we have been presenting since 2013 and in some form prior to that since 2011. This includes bringing electronic music and digital arts education by local Austin artists to underserved East Austin schools in 2017-18. This is one of our community pilot projects in partnership with local professional dj companies, businesses and DJs both locally and from around the world. Funds will go toward things like equipment, supplies, transport, insurance, background checks, paying teachers, food for lunches that we will bring and volunteers. We are beyond excited to launch this project and need your help to get spinning!

2) TEXAS HURRICANE RELIEF - For every $15 you donate through September 10th (including ticket purchases of $15 or more through September 10, we will donate $5 to community relief and resources ON-THE-GROUND in Texas to people who we have been verified as helping and whose efforts are going directly to relief for those most affected. If you are an artist in Texas or know a Texas artist directly affected by Hurricane Harvey, please email us ASAP

To support, please click on the DONATE button below

3) DEDICATION - Our executive/creative director Andria Benet founded Protos in late 2012 and launched it in 2013 after prototyping the project and proposing it to local and international festivals as early as 2010. One of the biggest goals has been to create a full-time (or at least nearly full-time) paid position for Andria to dedicate her time and energy to Protos. This includes a salary for Andria, as well as funding for more part-time support staff who can regularly assist Andria. Your donations will help our organization continue and not dissolve after four years of blood, sweat and tears.

WHY HELP?Protos is asking those who can help give do so. Even if it's just $5 or $10.... you may be surprised how far dozens or hundreds of people donating a small amount can go. If you give to foundations other than art or to other art organizations - or you give to tech startups - please consider being one of our "angels" aka donors so that Protos can continue this important work of not only bringing art and tech together for good but also bringing people together through art in a way that dissolves any superficial differences.

To support, please click on the DONATE button below

4) ACCESS - The last we checked in July 2017, one in five Americans is disabled. The number is somewhere around 57 million or something like that. Don't quote us on that but we think it is around that number. Even that number, 57 million people, that is just identified people. That is not people who are not even aware they are disabled, not people who do not consider themselves disabled because it's temporary or think they will get over it, not people who are not being counted or represented because they are homeless and/or not people in denial or unaware they have a disability at all. Many people who do not know they have a disability need help. Our founder was one of those people and is determined to help the world be a more accessible place to people with disabilities, regardless.

Disabled people come in all shapes and sizes. Disabilities can be physical, mental, intellectual. Some disabled people do not look disabled, yet they may struggle just as much or even more than those who are obviously disabled. Our founder Andria Benet is a permanently disabled person and has been for over ten years. She deals with one aspect or another of her disabilities every day and throughout the day. Before becoming disabled, Andria worked with disadvantaged people of all kinds - including those with disabilities, veterans and the homebound elderly. She was a social worker, mental health professional, forensic researcher and clinical intern, an intake coordinator who helped people access their mental health benefits and get emergency care, and later a research associate in the field who went to people's homes in the East Bay of California to assess them for social services and therapy. Since becoming disabled herself, she has slowly but surely stepped into the role of advocate for people with disabilities and specifially for artists and entrepreneurs with disabilities.

Because of her own direct personal experience and her professional helping experience, Andria has a unique understanding of special accommodations and the needs of those with disabilities. Though it has been 27 years since the Americans with Disabilities Act passed, Andria acknowledges that society still has a long way to go in helping people with disabilities. Through Protos and otherwise, she hopes to especially help artists and entrepreneurs with disabilities. She has several ideas and projects in the works and knows of people with amazing accessibility projects that also need support. She is working with one of Protos board members to increase accessibility through Protos and for people around the world. Protos is always accepting email suggestions, resources, equipment for people with special needs, volunteer sign language interpreters, access-friendly media outlets and agencies, etc. Protos also needs help with media coverage to make sure we get these projects, programs, artists and stories the positive exposure they not only deserve but require in order to level the playing field for current and future generations.

Please help us increase access for Austin artists with disabilties and for our disabled founder. If you donate for this reason, please include ACCESS in the subject line so that we may thank you!

To support, please click on the DONATE button below

5) SPACE is the place! - Having our own space is long overdue. Andria has spent an inordinate amount of time acquiring and then losing and then reaquiring venue partners due to the population boom, which has created a massive amount of local venue changes in ownership, management or the business just totally dissolving. Protos is far from the only arts and/or events-based organization that has been affected by these local changes and essentially by gentrification of downtown, East and South Austin.

For those who know us, our venue partners are our bread and butter. Without them, we would not have been able to survive over the last four years. It is especially important with our increasing budget requirements as an organization that we do not continue to spend time, money or resources on venue spaces or rental only to find/lose these valuable players. We should also not have to pay for something that we are not getting an equal value in return - as we have in the past with our partners - just because demand is so high and venue owners/renters take advantage of this vulnerable time for small arts and events-based nonprofits like Protos. Cultural arts funding does not allocate much for venue rental and not nearly as much as new local venue managers and owners are expecting [ex. $5K/night rental fee on a weekend when it used to be a $5K cash and in-kind donation through the partnership].

Protos needs to rent and/or (ideally) buy a longterm or permanent physical space for our exhibitions and annual programs starting as early as October 2017 through September 2018 or (ideally) longer. With a "forever space", we would be able to have dramatically more reliabilty, consistency and ongoing activities for our community. We would also significantly cut down on costs and the need for able-bodied people to move our event and exhibition eqiupment by buying and leaving it in our space rather than renting and hiring someone to transport it to every event. We will also not zap our time by having to continually apply for, propose and negotiate partnership and sponsorship deals with venues.

If you are a realtor, venue owner, permit and/or real estate specialist who would like to help us find a "forever space", please email Andria ASAP. For everyone else, please consider donating what you can toward this cause. Please email us with SPACE in the subject line if you help/donate for this reason

PROTOS 2017 AUCTION

We have several auction items going up online in September and through December. Please email if you are interested in learning about them and making an early bid and/or donating auction items/services. We are auctioning at our event on the 30th of September and again through the end of 2017.

TO DONATE, PLEASE CLICK ON THE BUTTON BELOW

THANK YOU FOR YOUR CONTINUED SUPPORT OF OUR WORK WITH ART & TECHNOLOGY IN AUSTIN & AROUND THE WORLD

This project is supported in part by the City of Austin Cultural Arts Division of the Economic Development Department. Protos is a registered nonprofit in the process of obtaining our 501c3 status. Protos launched in 2013 in Austin, Texas